these little bright moments of noticing the news kind of thing you know being an american. i wasn't following south africa continuously but i was conscious of and supportive of the movement the divestiture of movement to get particularly universities to divest themselves of. money in south african companies and i know when nelson mandela spoke oakland university at the stadium there in one thousand nine hundred two i believe it was he thanked the students for getting the university to divest themselves of south african assets and that divestment was a was a big deal. when the week that i spent with his holiness the dalai lama one of the guys in our group and this is part of this is in that video that harrison ford made about was one of the leaders of the anti-apartheid divestment movement around the

world. and he suggested to the dalai lama that we should do something like that on his behalf so that people would not buy chinese products and the dalai lama was unwilling to go quite that far it's a whole nother story for another time but that was that those those were very strong times and there were very strong opinions in america about it. those of us on the left were very supportive of the show movement in other words don't invest in south africa those on the right were saying by not investing in south africa we were actually hurting the very people that we were claiming to help because people working people many african many of the black south africans working people were losing their jobs were being thrown into poverty because the divestiture movement which was true and yet it was arguably the main thing that brought down that government. i remember also. it's an

reconciliation commission that totally blew my mind i remember when nelson mandela became president of south africa and he said and i remember when he when he accepted the nobel prize with what was it e.w. the clerk or f.w. de klerk whatever the guy's name was the white racist guy who had been the president before him. and the two of them got the nobel peace prize. and here's the man who threw him in prison and had him you know essentially tortured. and had killed his friends. and he said i forgive this. and he any created this reconciliation commission where there were there were people i mean not a few of them there with bows probably tens maybe hundreds certainly thousands tens of thousands of people who had been in the secret services the police forces the under the the horror forces of that white apartheid government.

who had literally committed murder. who had gone out and killed a.n.c. leaders who had toys who were using torture and rape and just the most horrific things and nelson mandela said if you will come forward and confess your crimes. you will never be prosecuted. we should do something like that here right now for the bush administration with regard to what they did in for all of our vets who died that people have died in afghanistan and iraq which does not of course even remotely rise to the level of what nelson mandela was doing. but one example this man says i wish more of the world would be paying attention to. and my last recollection nelson mandela is his is i remember the reagan presidency and banner and all fired share of the reagan

presidency really well and i can't remember a specific example of ronald reagan making a speech in which he called mandela a terrorist but the position of the reagan administration was that mandela was a terrorist in the n.c. was a terrorist organization and they were not supportive of that divestiture movement . and i think that's one of the real blots on the reagan presence. now i notice that we got a bunch of calls about nelson mandela so i'm going to pick up our videos which are off that topic a little later on first to michael in redwood city california michael thanks for calling in. a couple of american president nelson mandela for his friendship with fidel castro. and most americans didn't understand the french or. south africa.

occupied namibia. that overthrew the socialist so the white running south african army. cuba sent thousands of troops to angola. and with that cuban help angola was able to defeat the south african army. the south african government had not even imagined the devoted south african army would never be defeated it sure can trace their roots of checked in so much they immediately began negotiations with the south west africa people organizations which led to the freedom of the media as how the. debt was a key factor to the fall of apartheid here about the sanctions they report but americans have never heard of the key role that cuba played help in south africa so i know some men though would never ever renounce bill castro right way to

hear it all year that was. do you recall what year that was. back in the seventy's ok i thought it might have been earlier and then i was wonder if it was tied into the to the death of dag hammer sold in his flight that in those there was a battle called the battle of people kind of all of which was the key battle which was supposed to be to them or me had ever experienced and that really did shake the power. of the two which was a key factor that americans are completely unaware michel thank you for being a better historian than me thanks for watching the show and i appreciate the call thank you thank you carmen in gaithersburg maryland you're on the air. tom thank you for having me i appreciate that. you made a really interesting. and i on the we're going to miss christian at a time where. some of that i was defining fulfill. that was i was

a terrorist. i didn't see quite as a terrorist organization so he couldn't fighters i tagged as terrorists and i'm really probably i would close and i was really young when i saw it meant a lot coming out of prison i never i never even imagined one day would come out of prison. today by two thousand and eleven if somebody sent me i would coast where president assad will actually pour his whole life. he was a student who became president he got put in jail by the current president right now in the ivory coast which is actually a puppet of paul the way. this person is going to conceal again can you imagine somebody the thought before what democracy and a pretty popular them in the ivory coast for forceful when he's hoping yours became

president and stop talking to the. because it would be printed before police can create because we want to more freedom we want more economy freedom. so in reality you feel that you knew it was terrorists or a swat. team. that's portable off work and came clean to break away from the system so what i want to have like. this is out of. pride it's not enough. and get better by the way stuff always. at the mid stream media. it's sort of like is sort of like watching history repeat itself as an army thank you thank you so much for the call and thanks for sharing your story tonight corey corey in langhorne pennsylvania corey here on the. i was. in my

pretty personal thing in the house and then those a great man did a lot of great things but no one seems to be mentioning that in nine hundred sixty one the sounds in the circus around the military group that led on him and against the government and the reasons he did that well let me just pause you for a second just to put this in context for most of his life he preached nonviolence and then yeah. he joined a filing group and participated in there was a there there were there was a waters receded and later he said you know nonviolence is one of the most powerful tools there is but sometimes you've got to step out of that i'm i'm i've always struggled with that let me toss it back to you corey your thought i was just wondering what it's like. descriptions i've heard of. today being basically painting him as a saint and you don't get me wrong he was

a great man i mean is wondering why our history books and why the. people don't remember the darker side of it and why it's not taught alongside well you can see instead of the darker side i mean you can simply call him a gorilla later i mean i. got very effective and curt was cutting the video runners some place today i spent two hours with. president salva kiir the president of south sudan who spent eighteen years as a guerrilla fighter out the bush fighting against. north sudan against against. you know in order for the two to bring about the freedom of his country george washington was a free for a a kori you're right and i think that both sides of nelson mandela need to be recognized but i don't think that i don't see that as a as a negative side frankly. is that madison wisconsin i pronounce it right. you're on the air we've got just one minute and we've got to pop off the air here so i'm going to yes very well you know there's all this. heavy hand-wringing and

all about employment in the west and it is because he gave basically a pass to the white and so that kind of fits well with people of that in the west they don't treat me the same way even though he was quite a strong stallman don't get me wrong mandela was a great person but he also dropped the ball by. keeping only a percentage maybe half a percent of blacks to take over the economic greens and the rest of the ninety nine percent as we saw in maracana minds have been suffering. how do i am a leader with that i'm familiar with that critique of him and i think there's substance to it. and there's this is thank you so much for the call this is such a complex topic this man has such a complex life and south africa the history of south africa has such a extraordinary. and complex history and that's it for your take my take alive

thanks for your calls. if we do get your call that i trust back next week and keep the video questions coming it's easy just grab your phone pointed at your face record your question or comment and email it to us your take my take. there's a maybe a leave out so we leave that maybe. by the same motions surely all your party is able to do is that no one is asking with the guests that you deserve answers from. politic only on our team.

play. or look a little. play a. little. cross talk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want.

as you probably have heard nelson mandela the former president of south africa has died he was ninety five years old and ella helped bring an end to the devastating apartheid policies in south africa as part as a political prisoner who drew global attention to the apartheid struggle in one hundred sixty four he was sentenced to life in prison for sabotage and conspiracy to overthrow the government and spent the next twenty seven years in prison while the apartheid struggle continued and became a free man february of one nine hundred ninety and four years later he became president of apartheid. south africa and he became that nation's first black president president obama reflected on the loss of mandela in a press conference earlier today. my very first political action

the first thing i ever did that involved an issue or policy or politics was a protest against apartheid. i would study his words and his writings. the day he was released from prison. gave me a sense of what human beings can do when they're guided by their hopes and not by their fears. and like so many around the globe i cannot fully imagine my own wife with the example that nelson mandela. and so long as i live i will do what i can to learn from him nelson mandela was a hero to millions of people all across the globe and his dignity and heroism and willingness to forgive and inspired generations to come.

it's thursday let's get geeky man that she's. going to go with. her does looks good doesn't it but it's it's our joint and that's because of rack toe rag top of me excuse me the latest secretive chemical that's in many of the foods we eat including perhaps juicy cheeseburger cracked open mean is in eighty percent of the pork and beef in the united states and is even used in thanksgiving turkeys that you just eat it's popular in the meat and told industries in the united states because it helps animals build muscles faster and more efficiently and it helps companies cut their costs on animal feed but despite the growth additive being in so much of the meat that meat eaters in america eat the f.d.a. has done very little research on just how dangerous wracked up a mine might be especially in humans but the research it has done is startling the

f.d.a. found that racked up a mean has caused more harm and healthy ailments to pigs than any other drug or added to. ever. f.d.a. research links recto put me into a variety of health issues and pigs and cows quoting bloat disorders like disorders the inability to stand up and yes death a canadian study looked at were top of means effects on rats and monkeys and found that the additive gave monkeys a rapid heartbeat the rats that were given racked up mean developed various birth defects including shorter limbs in large parts and missing fingers and. digits rance international studies on iraq total means f.x. have prompted the european union russia china taiwan and many other countries to ban it altogether in fact cracked open mean is considered such a danger in taiwan that in two thousand and seven thousands of taiwanese pig

farmers rioted after rumors just spread. that the government's ban on the chemical was going to be lifted also in two thousand and seven the chinese government seized imports of u.s. meat after fears that it was contained contaminated with ragtop me and just this year after the u.s. government refused to adopt or mean free certification for its meat russia stopped all imports of american beef pork and turkey. fortunately independent organizations like the center for food safety in the animal legal defense fund are working hard to alert the american public to not only the use of ragtop i mean but it's potentially harmful effects let's hope their efforts pay off their act hopefully in his band once and for all but until that happens. you might want to consider becoming a v. is

the good the bad of the very very popular formally ugly the good kevin led sky when alisa and frank constantini visited their local rite aid the day before thanksgiving they were startled to learn that frank's pain medication would cause way more out of pocket than the expect the couple who are elderly italian immigrants struggling to make the men's meet were distraught until the pharmacist stepped in. it was a get felt so bad for this elderly couple in dire need of medication he attempted to foot the bill with a swipe at this credit card the transaction was over but then she found that equal amount of money in her purse and just kind of left it on that count on the kind hearted gesture from the soul of a stranger was enough to at least temporarily make frank constantini feel like

a million bucks if you like the pain of it was gone and help this family believes that good still exists where to go have the bad us military i'm going down town hall bay prison hunger strike has helped reinvigorate the debate surrounding closing that facility is likely the reason that the military announced on one's days that it will no longer make public the number of detainees on strike a chord in the most recent reports that number stood at fifteen on monday a four person jump from november to our military revealing the number of detainees on strike serves no operational purpose a detracts from the more important issues which are the welfare of detainees and the safety and security of our troops and their words the army cares more about how the strike affects its public relations campaign by. right and it does about solving the underlying issues at stake you know the military actually want to solve the p.r. problem they could start by doing one simple thing and that is closing down the prison and the problem course is that requires congressional authorization which

means that they have to go through john. and the very very ugly congressman duncan hunter republican california congressman appeared on c.-span wednesday to discuss american foreign policy in the middle east when asked about his thoughts on war with iran here's how he responded. around war in iraq with american boots on the ground which would be a horrible book and i think people like to toss or toss around the fact that we have to stop them in some way from getting this nuclear capability i don't think it's inevitable but i think if you have to get iran you don't with the ground you do with radical nuclear devices and you set them back a decade or two or three. i think that's the way to do with a massive aerial bombardment campaign that's right no groom and people wonder why don't trust the united states politics this is a theory about. the

free speech rights of american citizens are under attack all across america but if you're a corporation you have all a free speech you want. yesterday for example the supreme court heard arguments and u.s. versus apple the case centers around john donne a staple an anti-war protester who was arrested on a california military base even though he was in a spot that had been designated as a freeze speech zone for public protests people went to the supreme court arguing that is first amendment rights have been violated after he was arrested for protesting in that designated protest area however a majority of the justices seemed in the arguments to think that his case was really not about a violation of his first amendment rights in fact justice scalia went so far as to

say if you can raise the first amendment but we don't have to listen to. first amendment reads congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of those of speech or of the press or of the right of people to peaceably assemble and to petition the government for redress of grievances because apple was protesting on a military base which is not protected under the first amendment is probably going to lose its case but school is refusal to address april's first amendment argument is a stark reminder that all across this country if you're an american citizen your right to free speech is already under attack the free speech rights of americans were under attack in oakland california in october two thousand and twenty eleven when peaceful occupy oakland protesters were met with clouds of tear gas and winding flash bang grenades from oakland police officers just a month earlier n.y.p.d. officers cattle and pepper sprayed

a crowd of occupy wall street protesters despite a total lack of violence. other than the violence by the police in august of two thousand and twelve peaceful protesters the republican national convention in tampa bay were met by hyper militarized police who would like to belong more on the streets of benghazi than ample four years earlier at the r n c in minneapolis democracy now host amy goodman was arrested and charged with conspiracy to riot even though she was just reporting. so ironically i was doing that you're right. right. there right there. right rice is under arrest. yet and just this summer nonviolent protesters at the annual alec conference in chicago or push out get arrested by chicago police officers take

a look. thank you. guys said was saying they are saying protesters are getting gassed in oakland and hitting the pavement in chicago the free speech rights of corporations are being protected in all of us by police forces across america and by the conservative justices on the supreme court who gave us the disaster's citizens united decision. as long as the right wing corporatist continue to control the supreme court will continue to see protesters being gassed assaulted and arrested for no legitimate reason to move to amend or and help show justice scalia and his conservative cohorts that money is property

not speech and the corporations are legal fictions not people. and that the first amendment matters. and that's the way it is tonight thursday december fifth two thousand and thirteen and if you haven't checked out the climate change documentary the big picture staff that i helped create head over to last hours dot org and stars explores the perils of climate change and solutions to avert disaster of this asteroid another mass extinction and don't forget democracy begins with you get out there get active tag your.

big. mind. and bank all that. money and i was actually sick for a politician right. here just to but it's a day's. put your comment on. the face.

pleasure to have you with us here on t.v. today i'm sure. you know councils here in the u.k. are calling for tougher laws to police aggressive bankers finally no longer will the banker beggars be shaking us down for yet more handouts and bailouts every time we pass the city no longer listening to them plead for more money printing and free credit facilities we're sick and tired of all the banker beggars harassing us every time we pass one of their toll booth cons like this famous one eight hundred we don't oh look i found it your banking system going to found trash on the ground before me through some dollars it'll give a berk give me a trillion i want another trillion more trillions do they give me give me.

a. very hard take. to get. that back with me here please. the put. president obama's trustworthiness is called into question declining poll numbers

show that americans don't have faith in their leader in chief just how far down as you fall and can we improve his image before it's too late frank luntz gives us the latest on obama's unpopularity plus p.r. strategist howard bragman and political commentator tanya acker on what the president means to do now to regain the confidence of the american people it's all next on politicking with larry. welcome to this week's politicking we're talking about the president's declining poll numbers and no one better to break it all down for us the real story with the pollster and republican strategist frank luntz one of my favorite people all right the recent c.n.n. poll of polls and frank by the way is a republic.